


Fridays

by Livruka



Category: Free!
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, First Meetings, Gift Fic, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-07
Updated: 2019-01-07
Packaged: 2019-10-06 03:34:04
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,141
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17337818
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Livruka/pseuds/Livruka
Summary: Hiyori hates Fridays. They announce the weekend, and, unlike most people, Hiyori sincerely despises weekends. They're unnecessarily long, provide too little entertainment, clubs are closed and cafes overrun. They're lonely.This weekend, however, shapes up to be quite different from the days he's spent his life dreading.





	Fridays

**Author's Note:**

> This fic was written as a gift to the lovely Tama ([ Twitter](https://twitter.com/MakoHaru_matuer)), and as she's given her Okay for me to upload it, this is what I'm doing.
> 
> I'd never written HiyoIku before, but Tama gave me a good reason to, and I'd do it again. (They deserve more attention anyway, duh.)

It's Friday. Hiyori hates Fridays. They announce the weekend, and, unlike most people, Hiyori sincerely despises weekends. They're unnecessarily long, provide too little entertainment, clubs are closed and cafes overrun. They're lonely.  
He's been dreading their beginning with bated breath and discomfort clawing up his spine since his first weekend spent alone as a five-year-old.

Nowadays, 15 years later, he's less passionately annoyed at them, but he still dislikes Fridays. Afternoon classes end too early, and he slides into the hot spray from the shower at the university gym with a lazy yawn. Rush hour will bring all kinds of people into the streets now, and they won't stop flooding his favorite places until Monday. No need to hurry out of here, because it's not like anyone's waiting for him, either. He may as well spend some time here, do some extra laps and hope that the coach won't check in to scold him for training past official hours again.

Steam is covering the tiles by the time Hiyori steps out of the shower. Unlike most swimmers, he likes his opening showers as piping hot as the one he takes after training, warmth soothing the tension from his muscles before he's even had a chance to strain them. It's cathartic, the quiet patter of water a welcome relief after too many hours spent among too many people he doesn't care about.

He's surprised when the door to the changing room opens and a boy steps in, training bag slung low across his back. A curtain of dark hair hides his eyes, but Hiyori is certain that he hasn't seen the guy before. A muffled yelp proves that the stranger is just as surprised to find somebody here at this hour; startled auburn peeks through the long strands when Hiyori waves a hand at him.  
"Hey. Come here often?"

The boy's eyes widen comically when he shakes his head and exhales in a rush; Hiyori can hear him falter before reaching behind his own back to find the door handle.  
"I got lost, sorry!" He moves to slip out again, and Hiyori feels himself deadpan. Right. Accidentally stepped into the gym with a training bag.

When the boy turns, Hiyori's eyes fall upon the swim team's logo printed across his jacket's back.  
"Wait." The boy startles again, shoulders rising, but he stays where he is, a hand on the door handle as if to dart away whenever possible. "You're on the swim team? I've never seen you before."

There's panic painted all across the boy's face. It looks like his neck got lost in the space between his shoulders and the jacket's collar.  
"Just moved here. I'm new." His clipped answer makes Hiyori wince in sympathy. Usually he's the one in that predicament. Moving towns. Being the new kid. Slowly, he shifts forward to open one of the empty lockers to his right, then retreats towards the gym with his towel.

"I'll be at the pool. Look around if you'd like."

He doesn't see the stranger for the next hour, nor does he make an effort to check on him. The boy's stance was clearly one of discomfort in the face of an unexpected encounter, and he may very well have taken off afterwards. Lap after lap Hiyori cuts through the water, where the cold from below is powerless against the heat coiling in his muscles. It's satisfying to feel those small spikes of exhaustion when he dives for a sprint only to make them unwind as soon as he stretches into the next turn.

When the door for the changing rooms opens, his focus shifts immediately. Naked feet slap against the tiles, and Hiyori stops to tread water and eye the stranger, now in a state of undress save for his swimming trunks and a towel on one arm. He drops it off at the nearest bench and turns away to stretch against the wall, tension lining his back.

He's not too tall, Hiyori thinks, but built like a swimmer. Wide shoulders, strong calves. Does he like work-outs? Surprisingly enough, his swimwear looks like it's well worn. Not a beginner, then.

Their eyes meet for a second before the other boy pulls a cap over his hair and dives for the pool head first, shoulders still high with tension, but his form is flawless. Hiyori feels inclined to ask about the boy's past training and his style but catches himself staring after the other's form as it starts raking through the water with unexpected force. Strong, wide movements carry his body through the pool, and his stroke is much more confident than his appearance suggested.

Hiyori only realizes he has stopped treading when he breathes in half a mouthful of water, and he gropes for the tiled edge of the pool to cough it back up. He spends the next few minutes watching as the water rushes across the boy's back, swallowing him under before he resurfaces with long, graceful movements. His hair peeks out from underneath the cap, and it's almost black against his pale skin. The powerful crawl is soon replaced by slow, smooth back strokes, and, after another turn, quick breast strokes. Hiyori blinks. Not a beginner at all. He pulls himself out of the water to watch from the side, skin erupting into goose bumps where the heat disperses, and sets aside his goggles.  
When the stranger finishes his first set of laps with a splash of butterfly strokes, arms swinging in wide arcs, Hiyori claps for him.

The boy's face is beet red when he pulls off his goggles and takes a short break against the head end of the pool, and Hiyori suspects it's only partly because of the exertion. He grins.

"Ever participate in an individual medley? Looks like you'd do alright there."

He isn't surprised when the boy ducks his head underwater, probably to cool off, before slowly raising it above the surface again. "Why do you care?"  
It's clearly supposed to sound defiant, a prideful remark that means nothing to Hiyori. He shrugs it off and nods at the pool.

"I train here. Five days a week, sometimes more. If you just moved here, you haven't been in any events this year-- but your form is clean. Highschool competitions?" It's a wild guess, but the boy's face opens up a little. He's hesitant, but it's no surprise. Being new is never easy.

A soft nod. Then, finally, the boy meets his eyes.  
"Some. I couldn't participate for the last semester. Moved right before the qualifiers started."

Hiyori slides back into the water, blindly groping and finding his goggles where he left them.   
"Race me in backstroke, if you want? I could use the practice." That's a lie. "And I'm curious to see if you can match my pace." Not a lie there.

The boy's flush is slowly subsiding, and his forehead creases with the rise of his anticipation when they get into position at the blocks. Hiyori glances at the clock while he pulls the goggles back over his head. Just seconds before the second hand reaches the top, he calls, "Hey! What's your name?"  
Right as he pulls himself up to push off the wall with a powerful kick, he catches the boy's confused stare, but the splashing of their start drowns out his voice.  
The stranger is fast, Hiyori realizes quickly, and his turns are incredibly smooth. The boy pulls ahead after their first rebound from the tiled wall, and Hiyori has to make an effort to catch up again, but he doesn't mind at all. It's exhaustion he seeks, the pervasive kind that lets him sleep early and wake after noon, so the weekend feels shorter than it really is. And exhaustion he gets.

Over the course of the next hour, they keep demanding rematches, neither of them willing to accept defeat, and only when Hiyori sinks against the wall after what must be their umpteenth race does he yield.   
"Alright, I give up, you win this one," He pants and yanks his goggles off his head along with the cap. For a moment the stranger seems surprised, then a small smile curls the corners of his mouth.

"You won over half of our matches," He objects, but his tone betrays amusement. "I'm Ikuya."

"Hiyori. I'm a second-year here. Wait, did I have to win your name?"

Ikuya chuckles and pulls himself out of the pool. Water drips from his hair when he tosses his cap onto the bench, and his goggles follow suit. "Not really."

They fall silent on their way back to the showers, and Ikuya seems less timid than he first appeared when he takes off his swimming trunks before stepping into the shower stall. Hiyori politely looks the other way. It's surprisingly comfortable, he finds, to have some company here at this hour, unexpected as it was.

"Have you signed up for classes already?" He calls over the wall and hopes Ikuya doesn't mind the small talk. Apparently he doesn't, because by the time they've changed into a fresh set of clothes and left the gym, Hiyori has learned that Ikuya has a brother who convinced him to move to Tokyo with him, which Ikuya didn't mind much as he'd only attended the university in Osaka for a few months, and that he's already looking forward to trying every seafood restaurant in town.  
Hiyori laughs at his tall goal but offers to take him to his favorite place on Saturday evening, which Ikuya accepts with a shy smile.

They talk about the swim team's meet with another university in a few weeks, about Hiyori's classes (economics) and how boring Ikuya finds anything related to-- you guessed it, economics. Hiyori is only mildly offended and drops his pout as soon as Ikuya lists the classes he's signed up for. Foreign studies.

"Wait, you speak-- six languages? How?" His mind attempts and fails to grasp how anyone could know more than two at a time, but Ikuya laughs.

"If you count Japanese, it's actually seven." He shrugs and glances away. "I've lived in different countries, and none of them had Japanese as their main language in class. It's not like I had a choice, so it's really not that special."

Hiyori would beg to differ, but he won't argue on a topic as sensitive as this, especially because Ikuya seems uncomfortable with it. Instead, he offers everyday stories about his cat - a fat ginger named Shrimp - and Ikuya bursts out laughing when Hiyori describes how she tore the fan from his ceiling twice by now. It's a nice sound, he finds. Honest.

They part ways at the train station, where Hiyori offers his phone number as well as a recommendation for a small cafe near Ikuya's new apartment. The smile he receives in return is surprisingly tight. For a moment it looks like he's going to turn away without another word, and Hiyori feels like he should reach out, but isn't sure if it would be appropriate, so he stays right where he is, while the towels in his bag grow heavier by the minute.  
Finally, Ikuya speaks up again, voice small. He grimaces around a sigh.

"Cafes aren't exactly fun when you go alone."

Hiyori blinks. Once. Then again.  
"Are you asking me to come along?" He winces at the way Ikuya looks like he doesn't want to answer that. "Sure. They have French breakfast and all sorts of drinks. Meet me there at 12?"

There's a beat of silence, then Ikuya huffs a laugh. He blows a few bangs from his forehead where they must be tickling his eyes. "Make that 10, or I'm starved by the time we eat."

This time it's Hiyori who laughs, and relief laces his tone. "An early bird, hm? Fine, I'll set an alarm."

They share another smile, then Ikuya takes off with a wave. Hiyori looks after him until he almost misses his train. He bolts for the platform while his mind is weaving hopeful circles around the realization that this weekend may end up much less depressing than all the others. He's almost home when Ikuya sends a first text.

"Do you like sweets?" Attached is a picture of a baffling assortment of cookies, chocolate, candy bars and even a small cake that looks like it's made of baumkuchen.

When Hiyori doesn't reply immediately, Ikuya starts typing again, sending a second message that reads, "I can't eat all of it alone. Want some of it for dessert tomorrow?"

Hiyori's laugh is loud enough to make people turn their heads, so he quiets down quickly and types out an affirmative. Hard as he finds it to believe, this is shaping up to be a good weekend, for once. And if he's lucky enough, it won't be the last.


End file.
